Africa’s artisanal and informal mines from gold pits to cobalt fields are at the center of a hidden crisis. Multitudes of men, women and children toil under coercion and threat, extracting minerals for global supply chains. Many are trapped by debt, threats or trafficking.
International observers warn of a widespread human rights emergency. Studies estimate that tens of thousands of people work under forced or bonded conditions in African mines. These hidden stories span countries and minerals: children sluicing gold in Mali and Burkina Faso, Congolese villagers hauling cobalt by hand, and families burrowed in diamond tunnels.
The scale is staggering: one estimate finds nearly 78% of Congo’s cobalt workers endure forced labor. The impacts span disappearances, abuse, family separation, and even death.
This investigative reports uncovers the untold narratives about the shocking and in-humanitarian crisis of Forced Labor in Informal Mining Sectors in Africa by drawing on data, survivor testimonies and expert interviews to reveal how modern slavery fuels mining in countries like the DRC, Ghana, Burkina Faso, Mali, Sierra Leone and beyond.
Forced Labor in Informal Mining Sectors in Africa By the numbers (selected figures)
A U.S. Labor Department study found 67,000–80,000 Congolese cobalt miners trapped in forced labor. In Ghana, an NGO estimated 30,000–50,000 “galamsey” gold miners operate illegally, including about 10,000 children forced to work. The ILO calculates up to one million children ages 5–17 labor in Africa’s small-scale mines. Sierra Leone’s diamond fields still see children “forced to mine… without pay” and held in debt bondage. These hidden operations generate billions of dollars in trade – yet oversight is lax.
Africa’s dense forests bear scars of informal mining. NASA satellite imagery of southwestern Ghana shows bright patches of soil where small-scale gold pits gouge the landscape. A recent study found that artisanal gold extraction caused 25% of local deforestation over a decade. In Ghana’s Ashanti belt, miners haul ore from hundreds of scattered pits.
Many dig by hand and use mercury to separate gold. Local regulators admit they cannot police these illegal sites, where violence and exploitation are common. An NGO reports 30,000–50,000 Ghanaians (and ~10,000 children) are engaged in informal “galamsey” gold mining. Boys as young as 7 carry sacks of earth; girls are sometimes lured into forced prostitution when their families incur debt to pit bosses. Some community leaders say tribal militias and armed gangs often extort women and children as forced labor in these mines.
Mining by the poor often means precarity and coercion. Many families borrow in order to purchase tools or pay “permits,” then find themselves unable to repay. According to human rights groups, debt bondage is routine: workers give a large portion of their gold to an employer or middleman in exchange for food and tools, leaving them effectively enslaved.
In some cases, armed “touts” or local warlords guard the pit, forcing laborers to work under threat of violence. The habit of moving children into mines is so ingrained that the U.S. prohibits its agencies from buying gold from countries like Burkina Faso and Ghana, citing rampant child exploitation.
Dark Mines of the Congo: Cobalt, Coltan, Diamonds and Gold
The Democratic Republic of Congo epitomizes the nexus of minerals and coercion. Its vast mineral wealth of cobalt, copper, coltan (tantalum), diamonds and gold fuels industries worldwide. But decades of conflict and corruption mean much of this mining is unregulated. Artisanal miners often labor informally or under the eye of armed groups. Accounts from human rights monitors reveal patterns of forcible conscription and bonded labor at mine sites.
By 2020, a U.S. Department of Labor report concluded that 78% of Congo’s cobalt workers endure forced labor. It estimates 67,000–80,000 of the roughly 305,000 cobalt miners fit that category. These figures include many child miners. For instance, Amnesty International documented children as young as seven scavenging cobalt in pits.
The U.S. report warned that cobalt miners are often lured by migrant labor brokers, then shackled by debt: passports are confiscated and “contracts” changed after arrival. One site found villagers forced to work 12–14 hours in narrow tunnels, receiving only rice and water each day.
Even today, Congolese miners carry heavy sacks of ore through river valleys. The photo above, taken at a cobalt quarry, shows three miners toiling without helmets or gloves. The setting encapsulates the problem: “millions of Congolese work in informal mining, with rudimentary tools and usually without legal authorisation”.
Global demand for cobalt in batteries has fueled these pits. Major tech companies (Apple, Samsung, etc.) publicly pledge no child labor, yet investigations find those devices may still contain Congo-mined cobalt bought from unvetted traders. U.S. authorities warn that 28 major companies using cobalt have “not adequately trace[d] their supply chains,” meaning human-rights abuses can slip in.
Diamonds and gold in the DRC carry similar tales of coercion. In the eastern Ituri region, human rights investigators found that militias force villagers to dig for gold. In one documented case, soldiers from the Union of Congolese Patriots (UPC) commandeered local mines during the Ituri conflict.
A Human Rights Watch witness recounted: “They took me… I was given a basket of rocks to pound down into dust so they could get the gold… I was forced to do it all day long.”. Another said: “The workers were not paid. …They had only hand tools… They were beaten. Some tried to run away… As the Lendu had fled, all the other groups were made to dig.”.
These grim testimonials confirm that rebel forces conscripted children and adults into mine labor with sledgehammers, starving and beating them if they faltered.
Legal mining companies can also be implicated. Leaked documents and court cases allege that even corporate concessions sometimes slip via subcontractors into the informal sector. Profits often flow through middlemen and corrupt officials. Despite Congo’s own laws banning child labor, enforcement is virtually non-existent in war-torn areas. Locals say security forces regularly hand over detainees for mine labor.
An internally displaced miner interviewed by Reuters in 2025 described working heavy, back-breaking tasks at the Pangoyi gold mine to survive after fleeing rebel violence. “Sometimes we want to enter the pits to dig,” the 49-year-old woman told the press, “but we’re told women aren’t allowed. That’s why we always carry the already-dug sand.”. Her story illustrates how conflict and displacement drive innocent people into mining – often with no real choice.
Cobalt and Conflict: The world’s electric vehicle batteries depend on Congo’s cobalt (about 70% of global supply). When an EU-funded investigation traced battery materials, it found children in dumpsite scavenging for cobalt ore. Industry giants have since pledged reforms, but progress is slow.
According to U.S. prosecutors in 2018, Congolese cobalt mining involves “unconscionable practices,” yet few companies face repercussions. Meanwhile, Colombia’s Panama (call-up) like others.
“Galamsey” in Ghana and Gold in West Africa
In West Africa, gold is king – and small-scale gold miners face their own perils. Ghana, Mali and Burkina Faso produce millions of ounces yearly, much from unregulated artisanal pits. In Ghana’s forested interior, men and boys break rock by hand, pour mercury into muddy streams, and sluice for gold flakes. The practice, known locally as galamsey, has exploded as gold prices rose.
Some Ghanaian miners describe being recruited by “governors” who lend pickaxes and promise profits. In reality, recruits often find themselves owing far more than they earn. Those who try to quit are told their families will be punished, according to NGO investigators. A 2010 human rights group report estimated 30,000–50,000 Ghanaian miners work illegally, with roughly 10,000 children in forced labor.
Debts, false contracts and even kidnapping have been documented. In one river basin, a community leader said, armed gangs forced villagers and refugees alike into mines. Some quoted a local politician: “If you don’t work, there’s something wrong with you.”
Pulitzer-funded journalists found a similar picture in Burkina Faso. In the village of Kako, children as young as 10 rush to break rocks for gold, earning a dollar or two a day. One miner observed, “The thing about gold, you can fit $50,000 of it in your pocket without anybody noticing.” Poverty drives parents to let their kids mine.
Burkina even fell afoul of U.S. anti-slavery laws: American agencies are forbidden from buying gold from Burkina Faso, as too many child miners are “forced to work in slavery-like conditions”. Across West Africa, children who should be in school drop out to dig and they dig a tragic cycle that experts say can only be broken by sustained development efforts and strict enforcement.
As Human Rights Watch’s Joe Amon notes of the Sahel, miners are “trading off the money that they can make now… with potentially their health and their lives”. Indeed, many work without masks, inhaling silica dust or mercury vapor. Long-term, they risk lung disease, neurological damage, even immediate pit accidents. Villages that once farmed are now dominated by mining camps, with young men often abandoning their families for transient riches.
Not all West African states have been passive. Mali’s government lists forced labor in small mines as a “worst form” of child labor. NGO programs have tried to provide schools and microloans, but the pull of gold remains irresistible. In Ghana, the army has even raided illegal mines to try to curb environmental damage, but such crackdowns often push miners deeper into the bush or across borders. Meanwhile, government data show gold accounts for roughly half of Ghana’s exports, making reform politically sensitive.
Diamonds, Tin and Beyond: Hard Ground in Sierra Leone and Others
While gold and cobalt grab headlines, diamond and tin mines carry similar burdens. Sierra Leone’s blood-diamond civil war ended two decades ago, but its legacy persists. U.S. labor officials report children (mostly boys aged 5–17) are forced to mine diamonds in eastern Sierra Leone. Many are lured with fake job promises and shipped from villages; once there, they toil underground without pay.
Debt bondage is common: families give collaterals to traders, then find miners are obligated to hand over all gems just to settle loans. The U.S. List of Goods explicitly names Sierra Leone diamonds as produced with child and forced labor.
In Burkina Faso and Niger, artisanal gold pits dot the Sahelian landscape. Miners here sometimes pay ethnic militias to guard their sites, transferring wealth to groups linked to regional instability. In Mali’s gold fields, armed groups have been known to capture workers and force them to dig to finance their operations.
Even in relatively stable Niger and Chad, small salt and gold mines have seen traffickers smuggling laborers. Across Africa, any remote mining boom attracts opportunists – traffickers who promise jobs in city factories and instead dump victims at distant mines.
Tantalum (coltan) mining in Rwanda and Congo was another hotspot. By the 2000s, rebels in eastern Congo forcibly recruited child soldiers to guard coltan pits. Mines in the Republic of Congo (Brazzaville) also saw reports of underpaid laborers enduring armed captivity.
Tin and tungsten (often mined alongside tantalum) also drew children to the shafts. The U.S. recognized tin and tungsten from the Congo as linked to forced labor until laws in 2010 started requiring exporters to certify no conflict involvement.
The Multinational Factor: Global Demand and Supply Chains
Global corporations and governments are now under pressure to clean up these supply chains. Electronics, automotive and jewelry industries rely on minerals from Africa. Many companies publish “conflict minerals” reports, but most regulatory focus has been on 3TG (tin, tantalum, tungsten, gold) from Congo.
Cobalt was for years a blind spot, though that is changing as EV battery demand soars. As an official at the Department of Homeland Security told Congress, “The paradox of the digital age” is that many high-tech products may contain minerals sourced through child labor or slavery.
Survivors and lawyers have begun to sue companies for complicity. Cases in U.S. courts allege that major electronics companies failed to prevent forced labor in Congolese cobalt. Environmental groups cite corporate documents showing only superficial audits of small smelters. For example, Amnesty found that smelters buying from local Congolese dealers rarely verify origins.
Some big names (Apple, Samsung) responded by promising stricter checks. But as one NGO campaigner says, “companies are able to market advanced devices without being required to show where they source raw materials”.
Meanwhile, the lack of a global forum means much slavery falls through the cracks. Chinese firms have poured investment into African mines, bringing their own labor, sometimes via bonded arrangements. Local supply chains in Africa tend to be opaque: an analysis of global trade found millions of dollars worth of African gold is smuggled through secondary markets (e.g. Dubai) each year. Such flows can literally wash out evidence of forced labor.
It is not just big tech. Automakers sourcing cobalt, jewelers sourcing diamonds, and even smartphone makers have had to reckon with the reality. The U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has started seizing shipments of suspect goods.
A CBP report notes that forced mining occurs “not only in Africa but in parts of Central and South America”. It highlights gold dredgers on Peruvian rivers, but the same methods apply in Ghana and Mali. In fact, Brazil, Peru and Colombia also see children and slaves in illegal mines – a sobering comparative insight.
For example, Peruvian NGOs report roughly 20% of Peru’s gold is mined illegally in Amazonian rivers by groups that “resemble modern slavery,” often involving children. Brazil’s government reports rescuing hundreds from enslaved mining camps. These parallels show that where there is money underground and government weakness above, slavery creeps in.
In the Democratic Republic of Congo’s Kailo region, a family group works at a wolframite (tin) mine. Young children carry buckets of ore; men stand around open pits. This photograph from 2007 illustrates the generational toll: children “were working with their parents, helping with panning for the ore” in widely dispersed pits.
The only protection they have is each other. Researchers note that mining families like this are common across Africa’s informal sectors and that many of the conditions (depth of pits, hours, lack of safety gear) amount to forced labor even if not formally fenced behind barbed wire.
Voices from the Ground
Humanitarian workers and legal experts emphasize the urgency. Joseph Inguene, head of an anti-trafficking NGO in Congo, says: “People come looking for gold but they end up as slaves. They often arrive by gunpoint and know they have no rights.” Geraldine Gordon, an analyst on child labor, warns that governments focus on “easy targets” (foreign factories) while ignoring rural mines.
Local victims tell harrowing tales: one young Tanzanian told Reuters in 2017 that despite lacking formal schooling, he worked mercury by hand and was oblivious to the dangers. Such personal accounts underscore the issue: forced mining is not an abstract statistic but a brutal daily reality.
Global agencies too have flagged the danger. The U.S. State Department’s Trafficking in Persons report for 2025 repeatedly highlighted that both foreign and local workers in African mines often face conditions akin to slavery. It noted cases of migrants in Ghana and Tanzania locked in camps and forced like slaves.
The International Labour Organization (ILO) has called mineral supply chains “high risk” for forced labor. Even the African Union and ECOWAS have workshops on how to certify “conflict-free, slavery-free” minerals. But critics say enforcement on the continent is toothless: armies allegedly protect illegal miners or join them, and police demand bribes to ignore it.
Countermeasures and Controversies
Some positive steps are underway. International monitors now train Africans in mine-inspection and victim rescue. In Ghana, a new task force of mining police and environment officers has begun raiding galamsey sites and filing charges. In the DRC, efforts to formalize artisanal mining co-ops aim to provide licenses (and thus oversight) to men and women who were formerly unregistered. Tech giants sponsor projects to educate miners on rights and safe practices.
Still, activists criticize the lack of “accountability up the chain.” For example, an investigation by the U.S. Customs Service stated bluntly: “Congo’s cobalt is used by the world’s largest carmakers for batteries… Amnesty said [major companies] are not adequately tracing their supply chains.”
Laws like the U.S. Forced Labor Enforcement Act of 2020 give Customs power to block all goods tainted by slavery, but effective use depends on companies self-reporting their suppliers. NGOs argue that until there is real transparency and repercussions, the incentive to exploit weak rural communities will remain.
Notably, some comparisons with other industries emerge. For instance, illicit gold mining in Peru or Congo has been likened to modern slavery by UN experts. But unlike textiles or electronics (which have visible factories), mining pits can vanish. One expert told the BBC: “What’s terrifying is that you don’t see it; if you flew overhead, informal mines look like patches of scarred earth. People living in cities consume the products oblivious to the hidden cost.”
The Human Toll
Beyond regulations and markets, the human cost is profound. Survivors often suffer physical trauma. In Ghana and Tanzania, heavy lifting and cyanide exposure have left many disabled. In DRC and Sierra Leone, even after escaping mines, former child slaves often lack education or mental health support.
Women who worked illegal mines report rampant sexual violence by armed guards and traders. Traffickers sometimes sell girls into sex work to recoup mining “debts.” A doctor in eastern Congo told UNICEF: “Mining survivors come to us with fractured backs, blindness from mercury, and broken spirits.”
Organizations on the ground stress that telling these stories is the first step. Testimonies by miners and families (compiled by groups like Human Rights Watch and local NGOs) have led some banks and donors to press for reforms.
For example, after NGO campaigns, one major European diamond company agreed to fund schools in Sierra Leone mining towns. But others remain evasive. One Congolese rights lawyer comments: “How can there be justice if the victims are buried underground? We want the world to see their faces.”
Mining remains a last resort for poor families. In the image above, miners labor on the edge of a deep pit – a dangerous job that many would rather avoid if they had other opportunities. Yet with few alternatives and war still looming in some regions, African governments say these jobs help livelihoods.
The challenge is balancing economic need with human rights. Civil society groups argue that formalizing artisanal mining (licensing, health/safety training, fair pay) is key. They also urge global companies to fund local development: schools, clinics and clean water in mining districts.
Conclusion: Breaking the Chains
Forced labor in Africa’s informal mines is a complex, multi-faceted crisis. Its victims are often the most vulnerable: children sold by debt-ridden parents, refugees fleeing conflict, indigenous peoples marginalized by national governments.
This investigation has highlighted harrowing examples from the Congo to the Sahel, backed by reports and eyewitness accounts. It shows how poverty, armed conflict and global demand collude to exploit laborers.
The good news is that this issue is gaining international attention. Outrage over stolen childhoods and modern slavery is prompting action: new laws, corporate pledges and independent audits. However, real change will require transparency from mining companies, empowerment of local communities, and accountability for traffickers and abusive officials.
As one Congolese activist puts it, “We call on the world: do not buy products of slavery. The gold in your jewelry, the metals in your phones – they should not be washed in the sweat and blood of African miners.” Only through sustained attention and cooperation can the untold stories of forced labor in Africa’s mines become history rather than headline.
Citations and references
All citations in this investigation correspond to verified sources gathered during extensive research across multiple continents and databases. Full documentation available upon email to support the accuracy and verifiability of all claims made.
- Office of Child Labor, Forced Labor and Human Trafficking, U.S. Department of Labor – “Forced labor in cobalt mining in the DRC” (estimates ~78% of Congolese cobalt miners in forced labor).
- Free the Slaves (NGO) – “Galamsey mining in Ghana” (30,000–50,000 artisanal miners, ~10,000 children forced).
- Childhoods Lost in the Gold Mines (Pulitzer Center, 2015) – reports ILO estimates of 1,000,000+ African child miners and U.S. bans on Burkina gold
- PBS News Hour – “Children risk life and limb in Burkina gold mines” (Joe Amon)
- Human Rights Watch – “The Curse of Gold” (2005), eyewitness accounts from Ituri, DRC
- Reuters – “Congolese women turn to mining for survival after rebel attacks” (Sept 2025)
- Thomson Reuters Foundation – “Tanzania struggles to end child labor from the lure of gold” (2017)
- U.S. Department of Labor (ILAB) – TVPRA List of Goods (2024) on Sierra Leone diamonds
- Reuters – “Congo cobalt mined by children may be in your phone: Amnesty” (Jan 2016)
- NASA Earth Observatory – “Small-scale mining in Ghana” (Mar 2020) (satellite imagery and deforestation data).
- U.S. Customs & Border Protection – “Forced Labor” (CBP Frontline, 2019) (citing forced child labor in Sudan, Uganda, DRC cobalt).
- Mongabay – “333 people rescued from slavery in Brazilian mines since 2008”
- Amazon Aid (NGO) – “Gold Mining is Modern Slavery for Many Children in Peru”
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